At-home workouts are great for people who don’t like group fitness classes, are too impatient to wait for weights or stations, or who want to keep moving on those days they want to work out but don’t want to leave home. And thankfully, there are tons of solid options on YouTube, so you can get a good sweat or stretch on, without having to pay for a gym membership.
Now that we’ve all been told to quarantine and/or practice social distancing, I’m more grateful than ever for these options. Even better? I’ve been able to do many of them on the road (I recommend this travel yoga mat because it’s inexpensive, light, and folds up so it doesn’t take up much space). For most of these channels, you’ll only need a workout mat, comfy clothes, and shoes.
Word of caution: we’re not doctors, physiotherapists, fitness instructors. Listen to your body, don’t do anything that doesn’t feel good, and consult with your doctor if you have any concerns.
I rarely like doing the same type of workout twice in a row, so I bounce between a bunch of channels. That lets me get the right balance of cardio, strength, and stretching.
Yoga With Adriene is where I started when I first got back into working out. I find her routines are a little gentler, so they can be easier for beginners. I also love her humour, the regular focus on self-care, and her mantra about “find what feels good”. If you search the channel, you can find at least one video for pretty much anything, and she has options for people who like to be told what to do. Specifically, she curates monthly lists of previous workouts that are centred around a theme, and she creates a new 30-day challenge every January (this year’s was Home).
Once I built up my strength and was ready for something more, I was excited to find Yoga with Tim. His routines are tougher than Adriene’s, but the vibe is similar because he’s all about making sure you’re getting the most out of your home yoga practice without injuring yourself. I’m still working my way through his 2020 30-day challenge and I’m loving it.
When I was looking for ways to build up my core strength and prevent back pain, I found the Pop Pilates channel Blogilates. On YouTube, Cassey Ho posts a daily playlist that you can go through. However! If you haven’t done Pop Pilates before I strongly recommend heading first to her website and start with the beginners calendar. It starts a little easier and then builds up to the intensity of the daily workouts. She also has a PII28 calendar, which is a set of 28-minute pilates-based intense interval training workouts (they will kick you in the butt, as my 5 year old likes to say).
Most recently, I found Heather Robertson’s channel, which offers a ton of total body, HIIT, and tabata workouts. Some require weights, many do not. Every workout I’ve done from here has left me sweating, with a red face, and a whole bunch of stress melted away. I’m currently working my way through her 12-week workout plan and I adore it. Because a lot of her workouts include plyometrics and other high-impact exercises, I recommend people with joint concerns first check out her video for low-impact modifications.
My favourite channel for when I don’t want any of those is PopSugar Fitness, because it has something for everyone. Seriously, search for something and you’ll likely find it because they offer options like cardio dancing, kickboxing, barre, yoga, HIIT, Zumba, strength (with or without weights), and bootcamp videos.
Sarah: Social distancing is entirely my jam for so many reasons, and I’ve been working out at home for…wow, I just counted, and it’s nearly two decades. Before we had kids, we invested in a small weight machine and a treadmill, and both are still going strong, but I also do floor workouts, mat routines, and bodyweight exercises, too. About 10 years ago, I hired a personal trainer to come to my house once a week to teach me how to work out at home, and I learned a lot from him about how to adapt and use my surroundings to work out. Early on, he had me running up and down my stairs 5-10 times as a warm up, which I still do. He also taught me progressive sequences with items I already had, such as doing squats with an empty laundry basket, then a full one, then holding a full bottle of detergent (ow).
Tara has already linked to some of my favorite YouTube channels for online workouts, but if you’d like to blast some music and follow a sequence that isn’t from a video, here are a couple of terrific options.
Bodyweight exercises like push ups: If you’re stuck in the house and want to challenge yourself, how about a push up sequence?
Greatist has gifs of proper push up form and one of my favorite online workout sites, Nerd Fitness, has a full guide to pushups, including what to do if you can’t do one.
NerdFitness also has a beginner bodyweight routine that’s focused and uses household items.
But my favorite routine, which makes me grin every time I think of it: the NerdFitness Konami Code workout.
Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A start.
Pull up or rows, push ups, lunges, burpees, squat, repeat.
Other options when I’m stressed? I put on headphones and music, and I dance. I have a very old Wii with Zumba on a disk, and I use that sometimes, or I boogie around my house. Even if you’re not trying to do a full workout, dancing around the house is terrific fun, it’s good for your stress levels, and it can help with burnout. I also sing and dance while washing my hands for the required time period. The Killers is good for this and as an added bonus, embarrasses my 14 year old quite a bit.
Now that we’re all in my house working, we’ve started an hourly break. 100 jumping jacks or sit ups, 50 high knees or leg lifts, then back to work. Hello, endorphins, I like you so much.
Amanda: I’m seconding everything Tara said about Yoga with Adriene. She has a huge backlog of videos with specialized routines. My favorites are her ones for back pain and for when you’re on your period.
I also prefer things that “game-ify” a workout. I own Ring Fit on the Nintendo Switch, which treats working out as a way of defeating monsters. It is way more difficult than you think. And, if you don’t have the time to complete a full level or stage, there are quick workouts that isolate muscle groups that you can jump right into. The $80 price tag might be off-putting, but I’ve really enjoyed it.
Just Dance (which I have on the PS4) is another fun way to get your heart rate up. On the PS4, there are several ways to set up (camera, Move controllers, or an app on your phone). I use the camera since I have PS VR, but I like that they have an app option for those who don’t want to buy a bunch of extra equipment.
Sneezy: I love working out at home! And second what Tara said about Blogilates!!! Most of Cassey’s stuff is great for small spaces, and her one song challenges are a great way to pump yourself up. Shape of Your Thighs is my favourite, and I think my sister’s too.
Dynamic stretches are also really great for loosening and warming up before workouts. When I was really tight, I’d spend a lot of time on them, and sometimes they’d basically be my whole workout. Lesson learned after a torn hamstring. Pain bad. Keeping up with stretching definitely helps me keep my muscles there from sticking together. This is where I’m highly motivated to be a good girl, because if I leave it, I’d need a pro to separate them for me. Then I’d REALLY be crying.
Remember when stretching your legs, you should feel it in your muscles, not your knees. A good way to avoid that for static stretching is to avoid floor stretches where your legs aren’t bent. Instead elevate the leg you want to stretch onto a chair or other hard surface, keep your back straight and hips pushed in, and bend forward. You can do this with your hips parallel with your toes or turned at a 45 degree angle. The parallel position will stretch the back of your leg, while the 45 degree angle will help you get at your inner muscles.
Curling up with a stack of books is great, but it can also lead to tight hips from sitting so long. This video on the channel FemFusion Fitness also really helped me with my hips. This one doesn’t use any equipment, and for one stretch, she recommends using a pillow, folded up blanket, or something just to elevate your hips a little if you need it. There are other videos for opening hips, and some of them require a foam roller. If that’s not accessible to you, you can try a tennis ball or other kind of smallish, hard ball for some of the movements, like rolling out your hips directly. If none of those are on hand, you can also try doing 50 or so jumping jacks to warm your body up and mushing your muscles by hand.
This video is Sterling K Brown sharing his body weight pyramid workout, which is 50 jumping jacks, 40 squats, 30 butt ups, 10 burpees, and 10 pullups. He repeats this routine three times per workout. If you don’t have equipment that you can do pullups on at home, try doing tricep pushups or work your way up to it. Brown goes into more detail about safety and technique for each movement.
If you’re a hard core munchkin feeling down and not sure where to get your adrenaline kick from, Cirque du Soleil’s official youtube channel and the channel cirqueLIFE both have really hard core workouts you can check out (at least, they’re super hard core to me. Mileage may vary, batteries not included).
All the ones I’ve seen are led by Elisabeth Cauchois, who will calmly and compassionately kill you, with a smile on her face and impeccable control. (On cirqueLIFE, you can see her lead her class in full makeup, and a lot of her castmates in costume and/or makeup. It’s like seeing a glittering sorceress bespell fantastical creatures.)
For munchkins like me, who are bespelled by her but are far from pro athletes , remember to be gentle with yourself and focus on form. Forcing yourself to push through often means overcompensating with the wrong muscle groups, which leads to injury.
Dances are also great!!! My sister likes to blast some music and fling her troubles off, and I like to get my sexy on with some bachata or salsa. Neither needs a lot of space, and there are lots of great videos on youtube that teach you how to do certain moves. Once you have some basics down, you can also try to learn some moves from your favourite dancers.
Lastly, it’s not an actual work out, but I had a Taichi teacher who taught two types of vocal healing. One is where you suck in a deep breath, make a sound, and sustain that sound as long as you possibly can. The other (my favourite) is where you yell as loud as you can while jumping and swinging and flailing about. This needs a bit of space, but may not be all that much, depending on your wingspan. I’ve tried both, and I love them!!! They’re a sort of meditation and release of stress. You’ll have to see what works for you, especially if you have young children at home.
Maya: I haven’t yet figured out how to consistently work out at home, but I’m hoping I develop some good habits in the next few weeks! I did ballet for about 16 years and had to have hip surgery over a decade ago, so I’m perpetually working to make my hips and lower back happy (and always conscious when my body is not).
For the year I was living in Philly, I found a really amazing Pilates studio that taught me a lot. I paid for a personalized at-home Pilates program put together by my Pilates teacher that includes both standard Pilates exercises and foam roller exercises/myofascial releases that I plan on following. While I can’t share with you all the entire at-home plan since that wouldn’t be fair to my Pilates teacher, I can share with you my favorite myofascial releases!
There are a few exercises that I love to do using my foam roller. The first is a psoas stretch. My Pilates teacher in Philly is a delightful nerd who could spend the entire class talking about how amazing the psoas is (it’s the only muscle that connects your trunk to your legs! it is also connected to the diaphragm! some people call it the muscle of the soul!) and from her I’ve developed a deep love for my psoas.
Whenever my lower back is bothering me, I grab my foam roller and spend a few minutes in this stretch, just really trying to get my psoas to release (and trying to convince my cats that this is not their moment to pounce on me). Once I’ve had some fun there, I take the foam roller and work on my iliotibial band, quads, and hip flexors since, like I said, my hips are always communicating with me. I spend a few minutes on each leg rolling up and down the foam roller and targeting various muscle groups. It’s admittedly kinda painful, but I really love working with my foam roller. If you have a tennis ball or lacrosse ball, you can do a similar set of exercises that focus on your glutes or on shoulder/upper back tightness.
Always remember to breathe and really sink into the ball or foam roller! Since I will be working from home and I won’t be able to move around a lot for the next few weeks, I suspect that I’ll be experiencing even more shoulder tightness than usual, so I’m planning on being nice to my body by spending some consistent quality time with my foam roller and lacrosse ball.
Catherine: You are all such lovely, kind, well-behaved people who clearly exercise in virtuous ways, while all I do is ride my bike to and from work and try not to die while doing so. I’m afraid all I have to contribute to this conversation is the Baby Shark Abs Challenge. I am so very, very sorry. (But not sorry enough not to share it).
(I have no idea what I will be doing if I get confined to quarters. I’m working from home at present and going for walks and bike rides well away from other people. It won’t be the Baby Shark Abs Challenge, that’s for sure.)
Sarah: Are you thinking, wait a minute, wasn’t there a romance novel workout series here?
Yes. Yes there was, and it’s more evil than the worst villain with the most dastardly behavior. Are there links? OF COURSE.
- The Valentine’s Day Media Coverage of Romance Workout
- Romance Novel Reader Workout I
- Romance Novel Reader Workout II
- Romance Novel Reader Workout III
- Romance Novel Reader Workout IV
- Romance Novel Reader Workout V
- Romance Novel Reader Workout VI
- Romance Novel Reader Workout VII
- Romance Novel Reader Workout VIII
- Romance Novel Reader Workout IX
- Romance Novel Reader Workout X
- Romance Novel Reader Workout XI
- Romance Novel Reader Workout XII
- Romance Novel Reader Workout XIII
- Romance Novel Reader Workout XIV
- Romance Novel Reader Workout XV
- Romance Novel Reader Workout XVI
- Romance Novel Reader Workout XVII
- Romance Novel Reader Workout XVIII
What about you? What are you doing to look after yourself at home?
I have been an off and on runner for a while (7 years, maybe?) and I’ve done races as long as 10 miles, but 10ks and 5 milers are my true love and since I’ve had a hard time staying motivated lately, I decided to reboot completely and start over again with a couch to 10k running app. Time to get out and enjoy spring.
I also like the Down Dog app. I don’t think it’s great for absolute beginners because it doesn’t explain how to modify poses with chairs, etc. But their “beginner” is fine for intermediate yoginis like me and they offer a lot of customization and I think they’re offering everything for free for a week or so.
Best wishes for good health to everyone!
Oh! I use Downdog, too – thank you for mentioning it! I was thinking web-based and not about the apps I use. That’s a great one, though I agree, modifications are minimally explained.
I’d say please stop reading my mind, but this is so exactly what I needed that all the SB team has my complete permission to keep reading my mind.
(Honest, keeping physically active was a topic in yesterday’s psychologist online session)
I love the Nike Training Club app. It has a lot of great free workouts and you can create 4-8 week plans. It is the best workout app I’ve used. I also like Nike Run Club too for tracking my runs.
If you’re looking for workout apps, try these out for sure
Les Mills has a 4 week sorta beginner version of their Body Combat classes on YouTube called Invincible. Their production values and music are great, and as I am completely uncoordinated, it’s nice that no one else can see when I kick the wrong direction or just flail around. The Les Mills streaming service is also offering a free 30 day trial now too.
Also, Adriene is the best.
Thank you for the Yoga with Tim recco! I’ve been working my way through Yoga with Adriene’s 30 day “Home” series, but I wanted more “oomph”. I subscribe to yogadownload and yoga collective, but I wanted to mix it up with new instructors and classes. Pilatesology has some killer mat, and I just ordered a pretty inexpensive pilates chair off of Groupon 🙂
Re: dancing. I like listening to Big Freedia a when I’m getting ready in the morning; I love bounce music but look like an idiot. I’m thinking I am going to deliberately practice and learn how to Bounce!
I heartily recommend the Robin Long Pilates challenges.
Here a link to the 30-days one but there’s also 21-days (if you are optimistic about the quarantine length 😉 :
I’ve always worked out from home in the mornings before work, and I solely use FitnessBlender videos off YouTube! They have hundreds of workouts of varying lengths and workout styles. I have print outs of my favorite routines and have them sorted by length and style/body part worked. Every night, I flip through my stack and decide what I’ll do in the morning, sometimes just doing one workout, sometimes mixing and matching to customize what I want to do. (For those trying to start morning exercise routines, it’s my #1 tip: decide the night before what you’re doing, and then it takes the thinking out in the morning!)
I’m very particular instructor-wise with my workouts. I get overstimulated easily, so no background music, and and I can’t stand it when instructors yell at me to try and motivate me. No thank you, I am highly intrinsically motivated, please stop yelling it is not helping.
FitnessBlender also has a super great website with fitness and nutrition information and workout plans you can purchase, but they have so much free stuff you can get so many great workouts without buying anything.
TL;DR, FitnessBlender is great and I love Kelli and Daniel and I often shout from the rooftops about how great working out with FitnessBlender is.
A few years ago I noticed my 50 yr old feet were feeling creaky in the mornings so i decided to alternate my 6 days/week jog with some lower impact workouts. I bought a mini-rebounder which I love and found a few routines from Pahla B Fitness which I have also come to be grateful for.
Pahla has hundreds of videos (most are not for the rebounder) including a 100 day series of 10 minute stackable routines plus others of various lengths covering the gamut of cardio, weight training, and balance routines for all levels of experience.
She also has very innovative chair workouts for those with limited mobility and her newest emphasis is workouts for those experiencing perimenopause or menopause. Her extremely chatty demeanor took me a while to get used to but now I find her charming and she’s wonderful for sheer variety.
@SB Sarah and Jill Q:
Down Dog does have chair yoga, and intro classes to restorative, vinyasa, and hatha. They also have a gentle option. The chair and gentle, along with yin, were added sometime late last year or early this year. Along with the original app, and yoga for beginners app, there are also new apps for hiit, barre, and 7 minute workouts. I’m waiting to try the newer apps until they add more spoken cues. Also, all the apps are free until July for those who sign up with a school email, so that includes students and teachers. They’re free until April 1st for everyone else.
Other options I like are the Aaptiv, MoveWith, and to a lesser extent the ClassPass Go apps. They all have audio. I tend to avoid video because I can’t see what to do.
So timely! Shortly before everything started shutting down, I fractured my foot in 2 places, so I’m hobbling around in a boot, and am limited on workouts. I have been trying some Jessica Smith chair workouts on YouTube. I also got sucked into a Beachbody On Demand subscription by a friend, and have been working on some upper body only workouts through there. I’m excited to see some other options in this thread for folks with limited mobility. Thanks so much!
If you want a dance workout, check out https://nianow.com/. NIA is a dance arts, martial arts, movement and healing arts practice, and they are now offering a 30 day free trial of their streaming website.
I’ll chime in on the Down Dog app love. And the chair yoga that they added was very timely as I am currently dealing with some tendinitis in my hand & can’t do most of my usual routines. Between that & my exercise bike I have been mostly managing my stress release cycles.
(You can tell the Burnout book by the Nagoski sisters has been read by most of my coworkers when they apologize for interrupting your stress release cycle after they text in the evening!)
Hi, waaaaaay late to the working out at home, but in February the NY Times had an article, “In 6 Minutes, You Can be Done with Your Workout.” I have done one of the three routines almost every day since, and it helps. I have wrist/ carpal tunnel issues, though, so the pushups are difficult. Thanks for the link on having trouble with pushups.
For anyone else looking for a quick workout, here’s the link.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/18/well/move/in-6-minutes-you-can-be-done-with-your-workout.html?referringSource=articleShare
We’ve been taking the kids out to the local walking park this week, trying to keep them active and exposing them to sunlight at least once a day. My daughter, who is 13, puts in her headphones, cues up some Disney music, and thus far, has smoked us all every…single…time. I went onto Youtube and just put in “walking workout” and found a pretty decent walking workout channel called Walk At Home With Leslie Sansone. I did one this morning that was 30 minutes, and got in over a mile of walking and torched over 900 calories. You can find it here. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCVl6ZdslZz2Zj-34bMJFPbg
Tomorrow, I’m going to try to find a Youtube barre workout, especially for my daughter, since she’s a dancer. I’m glad you reminded me about Yoga With Adriene and Nerd Fitness, I enjoy those sites as well.
I’ll confess to subscribing to the Peleton app, despite the awful TV commercials. Yes, there’s a focus on the classes you can use with equipment, but aside from the fact you can use the rides with regular exercise bikes with some small hacks, they have yoga, stretching, meditation, strength training, and outdoor walking/running classes with a variety of teachers. There are classes for all levels and you can pick what length fits your schedule. And not all of the teachers look like your stereotype of a gym instructor, Christine D’Ercole especially.
I love Bodyfit by Amy. while some of her stuff is marked as weight loss, it’s not something that ever comes up in her videos themselves. Her stuff is cheerful, interesting, and is really great if you are a fitness hater like me. She also has a ton of stuff focused on moms, liked videos on diastasis recti, c-sections, and other pre and post-natal things that you might need to exercise around.
Kicking it old school with Richard Simmons’ Sweatin to the Oldies Volume 1. It was $4.99 on iTunes. My mom and I enjoyed laughing at the exaggerated faces that the on screen dancers made while we dancing along. To quote the man himself: pivot your heart out. Indeed, Richard. Indeed.
Sweatin’ to the Oldies! A group of us used to get together in college and do those. Nostalgia bomb. I’ll have to look that up.
I’d looked up some old school Jane Fonda tapes on YouTube, since I grew up doing those – but it turns out that they did some moves that are now not recommended. Like “bouncing” into a stretch. IIRC (am also not a pro) it’s better to do that kind of move smoothly. Plus, its only cool-down move was this sort of upside down pretzel wildness that was flatly impossible for me.
Anyhow, be careful with retro stuff that does “advanced” moves, is what I’m saying. SttO was much more beginner-friendly.
After that… experience, I ended up installing the Planet Fitness app. I already had a membership, which was needed for the app, but apparently they are also streaming free at-home workouts on Facebook now.
Their routines are okay. You have to filter them to whatever equipment you have, in my case basically nothing. A little cardio every day really helps my mood, even if it’s not super ambitious.
Fitness Blender! https://www.fitnessblender.com/ You can search their workouts based on time, equipment you have to work with, workout intensity, what body parts you want to work on. It’s great. The workouts are all free, but you can subscribe to their site for extras, including recipes, though some of the healthy recipes they put up are free to see as well.
I haven’t tried any of the recipes, but the workouts are fantastic.
Thank you all for these options! I needed this!